Page 76 of The Replacement Duchess

“You need not see the good in something that was bad,” Diana sighed, but he simply shrugged.

“I try to see the best in situations, and when it comes to that one, well, there is not much good to say about it. I learned to hide theweakness in me, to turn people away with a sneer, and to stand up for myself, as I knew that nobody else ever would. Then when my father died, my brother got everything that he had always wanted, and I never went to the funeral.”

“Did you like your brother, at least?”

“I may have, under different circumstances, but in our position, it was not particularly the done thing to show any form of affection. He enjoyed being the favorite and the only one of any importance. It was all he had cared about, and so protecting me was not something that he ever did.”

“Then it is a good thing that you can do it for yourself now.”

“Do you not think me cruel for not attending my father’s funeral?”

“Why would I? I highly doubt that I shall attend my own father’s for much the same reason. You do not owe peace to someone who never allowed you to have any for yourself.”

“I suppose that I thought it was a cruel action, and in a way I liked it. After all, he had expected me to die in the war every bit as much as I had, but I did not, and he passed away shortly after my return. I thought that, at last, I could pursue studies of some kind. That is where it all became murky.”

Diana blinked at him.

“When my brother took over the title and the estate, he went to London to settle a few matters. I went to stay with him, and that is where the accident happened. To this day, I do not know what happened. One moment, he was telling me about some lady he had ‘conquered,’ and the next thing that I knew he was tumbling down the staircase.”

Diana’s hand flew to her mouth. “So you mean that… that you saw it?”

“I had thought it some cruel joke at first. I thought that he would sit up, laughing at the shock on my face, and then I would appear to be the fool. I was laughing myself, trying to make him give up the joke and get the teasing over and done with, and that was when a maid saw us. She did not see it the way that I did. She rushed to him and began screaming for help. I followed after her, and when I realized that there had been an accident, there was nothing that could be done. He was already gone.”

“That sounds harrowing. I cannot believe that you went through such an ordeal without being driven mad.”

“In truth, it was the aftermath that was maddening. I should have been grieving, not only the loss of my brother but the sudden change in my life. Just as I thought I would be escaping the threat of war, I was thrust into another role that I did not want. Then, along with all of that, I had the entirety of thetonin the complete and utter belief that I had done it, that I had killed my own brother in order to take the dukedom for myself.”

“And I suppose that as a duke, it is unwise to tell people that you did not wish to be a duke in the first place.”

“No, although it was tempting. Instead, I played my part and attended gatherings and was an upstanding citizen physically, although I cannot say that I was a joy to be around.”

“You are certainly known for being… unwelcoming,” Diana said gently, thinking back to the whisperings that Samantha had heard about him.

“And now you know that is not who I am,” he sighed. “But I thought that was the best way to be—cold and uncaring and aloof. If people feared me, they would leave me alone, and I could do all of the things I wished to do. However, when I tried to go into that library, all that I could hear was my father.”

“What do you mean?”

“He used to hate that room. He would stand over me while I was in it, threatening to?—”

He stopped short. Diana looked up at him, but he seemed uneasy about what he had to say.

“He would threaten to burn it down.”

Diana had hated fires since the accident. It had taken her a long time to use candles and lamps, even when she was no longera child, because she knew what could happen if one was not careful.

“Did he truly hate the idea of you learning that much?”

“He seemed to hate everything I did. I wanted more than anything to go in there and read and do all of the things that I had been denied for years, but something about that room and all of the things in it made it impossible, so I locked it and ensured that staff did not enter it. I left that part of myself behind, promising myself that I would shut myself off and never allow anyone else to see that side of me. Then I met you.”

Diana did not know what to say. She did not know what she had done to change him, save for the fact that she had cleaned the room and he was now sitting in it.

“I saw you and Samantha,” he explained. “I saw that the two of you had so much love for each other, and how in spite of everything that you have been through, you cared for your sister, even trying to find a way to care for her if she would rather read and never take a husband. I thought about that often, and how I wished I could have had someone like you. Somewhere along the way, I suppose I became glad that I had you. Maybe—maybe one day I can stop feeling so guilty for wanting something for myself.”

With that, the man that Diana had come to know hunched over as if he were a boy. He was quiet and fragile, and she did not know what to do besides hold him and whisper to him that everything would be alright.

And so that is precisely what she did.

With tears in her eyes, she reached out to hold his cheek, stroking it with her thumb. She felt him crumble into her, letting out a breath that he must have been holding for a long time.

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